More than a third of Michigan students leave high school without possessing basic academic skills including reading, writing, and arithmetic. This forces employers and post-secondary schools to take up the slack. This study conservatively estimates that Michigan businesses and institutions of higher education spend over $600 million annually to teach employees and students skills they should have learned in high school. The comparable national figure is $16.6 billion, but the human costs of K-12 educational failure are incalculable, according to experts' essays included in the study's appendices.